" . . . painting the looser side of realism . . ."
Writing about my life as an artist, plein air painting, traveling and whatever else might intrigue me.

Friday, June 26, 2015

Residency #1: Thursday, June 25 - rain

I gave myself an extra hour of sleep since we stayed awake past midnight talking and looking at some of Chris's photographs. Robin had said another day of nice weather was expected, but we woke up to rain. I decided that today was my opportunity to make spaghetti sauce, make some leaf prints, and start another rainy day porch painting featuring the tea cart.

I left around 8:30am for 13 mile drive to the Kroger in Hillsboro to buy a few things for the sauce, and called Martin once I hit the 4G network area. I'd had one cup of Robin's high test coffee and couldn't stop talking. The storm got more intense. It was bucketing down when I reached my destination, so I sat in the car to catch up with the blog.

I returned home with groceries, and made the sauce, carried all my painting gear, and got a printmaking station going, three 6 ft. tables! I worked for about an hour and a half and then went out onto the porch.

Chris had been out painting, watercolors in the rain under a large umbrella, but at some point his umbrella collapsed and he came back to the lodge. He was now painting on the porch. When I came out, he said two fawns had come walking through our trees while he was painting.

It took me a long time to settled into starting my painting. I usually like to get some distance from my subject, but I was sitting so close that it was difficult to see and measure things correctly.

I painted until it was time for Chris and Robin's demo at the museum. I didn't want to stop painting, but I wanted to see their program. I'm glad I went. I got to meet a lot of new folks, and Betty made both peach and strawberry ice cream! What fun. The boys did really wonderful demos, and then we came home for a spaghetti dinner.

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About Me

Permanent Collections : Columbus Museum of Art, Ohio Supreme Court, Ohio Historical Society, Central Ohio Diabetes Association, Open Heart Recovery Unit, University Hospital, Baltimore, MD, Richmond Art Museum, IN; Private collections in the US, England, France and New Zealand
"Debra Joyce Dawson paints colorful, evocative outdoor landscapes. She travels extensively, and her paintings can serve as a painterly travelogue to India, Bhutan, England, Ireland, as well as to her more local surroundings. Her medium of choice is oil, with preparatory sketches in graphite, charcoal, pen or watercolor. Some works are small and completed en plein air; other works are larger and more complex renderings done in her studio. Her energy and delight in color, light, and shape are dazzling. But she never surrenders her subject, and each building, boat, hillside, or human figure is carefully pinned to the picture plane in the context of its surroundings. This places her in the best context of American Impressionism, whether one considers John Singer Sargent or Ohio’s own Alice Schille or Edward Henry Potthast." - Susan Talbot-Stanoway, Director Zanesville Museum of Art